At the deepest source of divisions around social issues in our society, the cycles that keep us stuck are based upon an unrealized inherent self-worth and self-love within individuals. This does not mean that these social issues such as race, religion, gender, politics, socioeconomic status, and many more do not have very real embedded circumstances that grant disproportionate opportunities to people based upon these factors, or that we don’t make choices and use words every day that contribute to these disparities.

How can we become capable of knowing our essence is love amid the present systems of which we exist?

In fact, it’s our very economic and societal systems, media, and cultural norms that we, often subconsciously, adopt as parts of our ways of being that continue to reinforce cycles of inferiority/superiority, right/wrong, us/them, or blame-centered thinking. In order to get to the deepest sources to break these loops, it’s critical we don’t disregard these realities. Yet, in pursuit of collective liberation and the alleviation of suffering, we must also realize our own inherent worth in order to create lasting shifts.

Part of this includes choosing to recognize and alleviate the microcosm of the same suffering cycles that play out internally as we relate with ourselves. Unless this focus is included in the process, these cycles will just resurface overtime with perhaps new labels, yet it will still be driven by the same underlying source: believing that our deepest access to love and freedom are dependent upon something changing in the external environment.

Working in tandem with these two approaches:

1) process of self-realization

2) and addressing systemic barriers,

simultaneously allows:

+ liberation to come up from an intrinsic place, one in which irreversibly shifts the way individuals engage with themselves and structures of society;

+ and the dismantling of disproportionate allocations of opportunity and access embedded in the structures that facilitate movement based upon socialized identities.

Working to dismantle the external structures is not enough to alleviate the suffering that’s activated throughout humanity and earth. We must include a transformative, restorative, and self-realizing process that includes EVERYONE in it. Although the realization of our own wholeness and essence of love arises as an experience distinct with our knowingness, the evolution of this process is one based on interdependence and the participation of all.

How can we become capable of knowing our essence is love amid the present systems of which we exist? How might we consider that the shift of an external change in society rests upon the liberation of our own hearts from suffering? How might self-realization be facilitated in conjunction with intrapersonal transformation?

Edit: June 8, 2018: These stories are not meant to disregard the REALNESS of oppressive systems and how that manifests in the interactions between humans everywhere. That is very real and I am a part of it too. In this passage, I'm adding an additional focus upon empathizing with sources of pain, behavior, and how people incrementally become consumed by those systems.

Recently, I’ve been listening to some fascinating people explain what prompted them to shift from violence to love, from isolation to connection, and from blame to accountability. Although these stories are profoundly differentiated, they also carry a common thread regarding the process of self-realization.

art sourced via pinterest

One fascinating story unfolds as someone describes how after years of being in the Klu Klux Klan, it was finally inside a rehab center when his paradigm began to shift. He explained how the rehab community was made up of people from all sorts of perspectives, backgrounds, and life paths. As he engaged with the community, he noticed how even with his public reputation as a white supremacist, people in the group still treated him with care and compassion. His emotional walls began to break down. He participated in vulnerable dialogues, shed tears, and broke into laughter with the diverse group.

He articulated, “It doesn’t matter if its race, sexual preferences, or religions, it doesn’t matter what it is, they were different from me. And I just made a connection with them and started talking to them and learning. Getting to know them was definitely the key to the whole entire thing.”

At the same time, he was feeling a newfound joy with humanity, he was also facing shame about whom he had become. He had to reckon with his choices of violent and bigoted behaviors. He started to see connections between his abusive childhood, the way he felt about himself, and why he chose to put others down. This opening began a process of shedding his identity as a white supremacist and propelling a journey of learning to connect with the world with raw honesty and a new sense of self-worth.

What led him into a cult that adopted racist perspectives was not inherently about race, it was about unresolved issues inside himself. What led him out of these views was not about race either, rather it was about learning to love, feel, and connect. And ultimately a realization that his sense of worth couldn’t come from anywhere other than sourced from inside his own being.

In another dialogue, someone explained how they let go of radicalized Jihadist perspectives and violent tendencies. He had spent years clinging to an identity rooted in a specific ideology, preaching absolutist mantras, and seeking to manipulate others into adopting the same views. Although a few seeds of change had been previously planted, it wasn’t until he was in prison and engaged with someone who understood him that his heart began to speak to him in new ways.

It was a series of conversations with a person who inspired him to begin to trust humanity. She offered him something rare: she didn’t judge him. She didn’t seek to condemn him for his choices as a radicalized Jihadist, yet she still brought a brilliant tough love in holding him accountable for the effects of his behaviors. Her balance of compassion and sternness presented a way of being he’d never experienced. One that moved him to see life differently.

As he reflected upon the physical abuse he endured as a child and a deeply rooted self-sacrificial narrative driving his behaviors, he learned to let go of the extremist mentalities and opened his mind and heart to the possibility of a life free from hatred and blame. He found that celebrating the connection he felt to being Muslim didn’t need to be about violence or radicalization. He found shedding his “us versus them” mentality brought him internal peace, which reflected in his external release from violent ways.

What led him into adopting a radicalized Jihadist perspective was not inherently about religion, it was about unresolved issues inside himself. And what led him to shift out was not about religion, rather about learning to see the unresolved source of his pain and take accountability for how this affected his motivations and choices. And similarly, he also underwent a realization process that illuminated how he was as worthy of love as any human being on the whole planet.

When we hear people’s stories, we can more easily understand how they made certain choices. Previously held labels of who are oppressors and who are victims begin to dissolve. The dissolution results in a complexity beyond a right and wrong way of thinking. This complexity may be disorienting at first, yet it’s in this gray area where we can see people as humans rather than judge them for their choices as right or wrong. It doesn’t mean we still can’t hold people accountable for the effects of their actions, yet we don’t need to judge them. Perhaps when we show up with the intent to listen, learn, and understand, we contribute to the resolution of a conflict rather than maintaining the tension through our own fears, judgments, discomforts, and need to blame others. And we just might learn that our own need to blame those who have engaged in methods to which we disagree can quickly illuminate our own hypocrisy.

"The only devils in the world are those running around in our hearts.” Gandhi

Tension exists inside each of our bodies, just as it manifests externally between different groups of people. When we experience tension inside, it’s often a sign that something wants to move through us. This provocation can help us realize that the dynamism of life is manifesting in physical form through our bones, organs, and flesh.

The moving vibrancy can be experienced in a preferable emotional state, such as joy or love. Operating from these places, we may want to jump, sing, create, or hug our friends. However, when it’s less welcomed by our system, sometimes we label it anger or anxiety. In the more uncomfortable states, responding to the experience in this way is often rooted in some sort of fear of unfamiliar territory or threat to our survival.

Operating from these less-welcomed states of restlessness, it can drive us to act out compulsively. Searching for ways to alleviate the feelings, we begin to blame others.

In our search for meaning,certainty, and validation, we often make other people and/or groups the culprits of our own fear. We may blame the president, religious groups, or our partners and friends for the way we feel inside.

When we don’t understand that we feel scared or uncomfortable, we follow our fear into destructive, and often hypocritical territory. This can manifest into feeling hatred towards the very people we are condemning for being hateful themselves.

Hypocrisy is elusive and often disguised in forms of rigid moral stances. Although, ultimately, acting through hypocrisy maintains, and can even amplify, the issue itself.

However, when we are able to understand where these tensions are triggered and sourced within us, we can channel the dynamism with our volition into constructive and compassionate action in the name of a chosen higher value system.

Consider the landscape of today’s tension. Do we choose to blame and condemn organized hate groups like the KKK or Islamic extremists? Or do we bring inquiry and curiosity to understand what’s driving their perspectives? If we choose to blame, we perpetuate the issue. If we choose to seek understanding, to question, to learn, then we may operating from curiosity, empathy, or perhaps even love. From these places, we then are ultimately encouraging the behavior we say that we seek to experience in the projected humans we are blaming. We do this by being an expression of that loving behavior ourselves.

Instead of silencing and dismissing these troubled individuals, I began to think about the root of their emotional state. These white nationalists are driven by feelings of anger, frustration, and fear. They feel unimportant, unwanted, and threatened by a society they do not understand. Traumatized by a society that wishes they didn’t exist. There are many seemingly logical reasons why these white males shouldn’t feel the way they do. But reason is not driving these illogical actions ― emotion is steering the ship.

Once we begin to empathize with the roots of the emotional states, we can more easily access the ability to operate from compassion and love. Espcially because we realize these fearful states are universal and we all experience them. It’s from this place that change more often results in byproducts like peace and friendship throughout society.

On April 4th, 1968, following Martin Luther King Jr’s death, John F Kennedy’s spoke:

For those of you who are black—considering the evidence there evidently is that there were white people who were responsible—you can be filled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for revenge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great polarization—black people amongst black, white people amongst white, filled with hatred toward one another. Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love. 

Daryl Davis is a musician and advocate for social change through understanding and friendship. He suggests to, “find someone who disagrees and invite them to your table.” And Daryl does just that. While sitting at the table with Daryl, a former KKK member, Scott Shepherd, he says to him,

When you have an alcohol or drug problem. The alcohol and drugs are not the problems. They are just a symptom. There’s a deeper problem. Same thing with racism. That’s just a symptom. I didn’t have to address racism. I just had to address these issues, you know, within myself.

Let’s face our fears and make peace with our inner devils, rather than be led by anger into the hypocrisy of violence compulsivity.

After all, to bring peace, we must be peace.

Society is what you and I, in our relationship, have created; it is the outward projection of all our own inward psychological states. So if you and I do not understand ourselves, merely transforming the outer, which is the projection of the inner, has no significance whatsoever; that is there can be no significant alteration or modification in society so long as I do not understand myself in relationship to you. Being confused in my relationship, I create a society which is the replica, the outward expression of what I am. J. Krishnamurti

The idea of corruption always bothered me. It seems to be at the root of the deepest human challenges such as war and poverty. I wanted to believe that if there was a way to prevent corruption in leadership, then society could build thriving and healthy countries.

So, I looked toward those who carried evidence of invincibility in their character. Humans that upon receiving increasing attention, still stayed true to an initial pursuit in bringing peace and love to humanity. What appears to be a common thread that these strong characters shared is how they embody their ideologies in their every word, behavior, and action. Unlike the majority of leaders who preach about hope, love, and a better world, yet often never lived up to these claims, there have been some leaders throughout history who have demonstrated this inspiring capacity. It’s possible.

So, how could I cultivate this within myself? How could I embody my utmost ideals of living with love?

Over time, my pursuit continued to shift from learning how to prevent tyranny in leaders to looking inward towards how to prevent corruption in myself. In order to inspire others that actionable love is beautiful, good and worth it, it must be something I can harmonize in my behaviors and words. It also included exploring how I am, in fact, already corrupt. How we all are. Realizing how I share similarities with leaders both like Gandhi and Hitler have been helpful inquires.

Pic credit: Sell-Arts.com

By understanding how, when, and where I am already corrupt, it acts as a guidepost to seeing where I can build capacity to show up with newfound strength in loving ways.

When and how do I choose reactions based in fear, anger or numbness, rather than love and presence? What contexts am I vulnerable to becoming lesser than my greatest self? Or simply, when am I acting like a smartass?

Pic credit: riseearth.com

Once questions are formed, it can then be a matter of observation and listening. It’s about discovering who I am in relation to the rest of the world and it’s about learning how to uncover blind spots as to how I am not living through love.

At the source, not living through love likely all stems from fear-driven impulsivity rooted in our deep patterned coding. Although what it manifests as in the external relational space becomes what we socially construct in divisions, generating issues we point to and label such as gender, race, and privilege.

As the Trump election unfolded in digital media content, I begin to see expressions of blame and projection. People who I consider to be rather compassionate and open-minded were writing and saying derogatory things about Trump. Whether they agreed with his political approach or not, they were acting with anger and malice towards another human. My fascination at the hypocrisy sends me deeper into the quest every day: How could we learn to take accountability for aspects of the world we dislike, rather than blame adversaries?

Pic credit: rejourney.blogspot.com

If we embody the love we want to experience, then we can love anyone and everyone. Even those that we consider our enemies.

"It is a familiar vice. We project the sins that reside in our hearts, locating them far off, in others, in adversaries whom we then assail and persecute for our own guilt." Theodore Roszak

We often hear the phrase “look within” when contemplating how we can grow and transform into more loving and healthier versions of ourselves. From a spiritual perspective this can lead to helpful self-awareness as the subconscious comes to light. I’ve found a growing capacity to demonstrate compassionate action in the world when I’ve made peace with realities of our shared human evilness, from seeing it as different part of me. Why not also extend the exploration into the tangible, more physical realm?

Through discovering hidden parts of ourselves from a biological perspective, we can also learn how relating with the little alien universes inside and around us can work with us rather than against us.

It turns out that some types of microbe colonies help support us towards health and some don’t. However, this situation is malleable. When we know what conditions the friendly microbes want, we can cultivate our system to support those attributes, allowing these friends to come re-colonize our bodies. Our whole system can adapt!

In other words, when we understand ourselves in the context of our microbiota, we can work with these microscopic ecosystems to obtain superior quality of health by choosing how we interact with them.

This is another way, of many, to obtain deeper understanding about who we are within an interconnected world.

In his book, "On Spirit Medicine: Ancient Ways to Ultimate Wellness,” Alberto Villoldo demonstrates how within these ecosystems, the information exchanges can potentially wake up the body’s system for self-repair, detoxifies cells, and switches on the longevity genes. Although, like many other interactions, this holds potential for both positive or negative effects. The nature of the conditions we offer to our microbiome contribute to byproducts of either health or disease. Alberto showcases how various foods and supplements take different roles in the interplay of the microbes and human system.

For example, he explains how "Pterostilbene, Trans-resveratrol, and Curcumin regulate genes which oversee apoptosis, or programmed cell death. These products upgrade mitochondrial function and aid in the electron transport chain. They also decrease inflammation, and switch on the longevity genes (Sirt1) inside every cell.”

THE dynamics of

psyche + body + microbiota + dietary intake + environments

ARE FASCINATING TO EXPLORE

Ed Yong, within his book, "I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life,” articulates a tangible way to see the wondrous complexity of looking within. He states:

"The world around us is a gigantic reservoir of potential microbial partners. Every mouthful could bring in new microbes that digest a previously unbreakable part of our meals, or that detoxify the poisons in a previously inedible food, or that kill a parasite that previously suppressed our numbers. Each new partner might help its host to eat a little more, travel a little further, survive a little longer.”

Plus, what's at play here is not restricted to our insides. Yong explains:

“Every person aerosolises around 37 million bacteria per hour. This means that our microbiome isn’t confined to our bodies. It perpetually reaches out into our environment.”

From this perspective, we can see that by cultivating our own loving and healthy body galaxy, we are also offering those qualities to others as we go through life. Plus, these microbes are interacting with each other between humans as we walk around all the time.

Humans are basically elaborate vessels for the propagation of microorganisms. J. Sonnenberg

Gut microbiomes from different people can contain similar microbial species, but different strains, as this cartoon illustrates. Credit: Dana C. Thomas/University of Washington // medicalxpress.com

What aspects play a part in the relationship between our psyche, emotions, the two trillion microbes within us, and our state of health? I’ve got some clues through my experimentation. Do you?

A good place to begin focus? The gut flora. Why? Quantity. According to wikipedia, in humans, the gut microbiota has the largest numbers of bacteria and the greatest number of species compared to other areas of the body.

How diverse is your microbiota galaxy?

A Formula for Lasting Well-Being?

Noble Purpose + Connectedness = Vitality

LINKING A SENSE OF CONNECTEDNESS WITH LONGEVITY BY ILLUMINATING BIOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF DIFFERENT PURSUITS.

What are the molecular signaling pathways that transduce positive psychological states into somatic physiology?

According to this exploration, not all happiness generates the same effects on the immune system. Some types pass through in a more transitory way. And others become embedded in our embodied nature, generating enhanced well-being and health.

How do you know which type are you pursuing?

Barbara Fredrickson, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, helps create a tangible distinction between two types of happiness, hedonic and eudaemonic, through illuminating aspects of the expressions within human biology. These are described as:

Hedonic: Representing the sum of an individual’s positive affective experiences.

It’s the difference, for example, between enjoying a good meal and feeling connected to a larger community through a service project, she said. Both give us a sense of happiness, but each is experienced very differently in the body’s cells. Eudaimonic well-being was, indeed, associated with a significant decrease in the stress-related CTRA gene expression profile. In contrast, hedonic well-being was associated with a significant increase in the CTRA profile. Their genomics-based analyses, the authors reported, reveal the hidden costs of purely hedonic well-being.

Through the lens of the human genome system and researching 80 healthy adults, Barbara helps offer evidence towards how these differing approaches come to life in our species. She indicates that by aligning one’s life with deep interconnectivity and a purpose-driven existence, the essence of happiness actually manifests into the information systems that makes up our bodies within our genes and cells.

Basically, the physical manifestation process of well-being!

She informs us:

“We can make ourselves happy through simple pleasures, but those ‘empty calories’ don’t help us broaden our awareness or build our capacity in ways that benefit us physically,” she said. “At the cellular level, our bodies appear to respond better to a different kind of well-being, one based on a sense of connectedness and purpose.”

Perhaps the often stated advice to live into one's distinct purpose on earth holds a new type of motivation beyond spiritual growth, one of a movement rooted in evidence of cellular health and vitality.

One summary of Fredrickson's exploration states: "The finding that hedonic and eudaimonic well-being engage distinct gene regulatory programs despite their similar effects on total well-being and depressive symptoms implies that the human genome may be more sensitive to qualitative variations in well-being than are our conscious affective experiences."

The results bolster Fredrickson’s previous work on the effects of positive emotions, as well as research linking a sense of connectedness with longevity. “Understanding the cascade to gene expression will help inform further work in these areas,” she explains.

So, @Calypso and I teamed up to build bridges between mind and matter. We asked:

HOW CAN WE TAKE THE IDEAS AND CONCEPTS EXPLORED AT THE CONFERENCE AND EMBED THEM INTO EXPERIENTIAL EMBODIED INTERACTIONS?

The unfolding emerged into series of invitations in which we placed throughout the buildings, halls, bathrooms, lounges, dining areas and geodesic dome. The invitations open with an inquiry in the form of a curious question inspired by the conference topics. The inquiries then show a prompt. The prompts are in the form of a suggested action that evolved from the inquiry, leading someone into a direct experience.

The project, termed Let’s Drop In Together, reveals how through heeding the call into the unknown and with a grounded focus, we can begin to see things anew. This gives way to an allowing of the emergence of sensational feelings and insights at the subtle level.

THE INTENT SEEKS TO AWAKEN DORMANT BODY SENSES, TO BRING CHILDLIKE WONDER INTO THE IMMEDIACY OF LIFE AND TO EXPLORE THE UNKNOWN OF WHAT CAN EMERGE WHEN WE ENGAGE IN NEW WAYS.

The inquiry > prompt > experience format brings the conceptual frameworks into explorations of interactivity between people as well as between the self and the body.

For example, one could leverage scientific frameworks to clarify the underlying interconnectivity of everything. Yet, what does this mean as to how we might actually interact with the world, ourselves and each other differently if we carried embodied connectivity as we dance through life? This type of contemplation illuminates the foundational inspiration behind some of the questions, such as:

Is this wall alive? Whisper it a secret.

Is there an edge to your body? Shake someone’s hand, slowly move your hands apart and feel what’s between them.

Or perhaps the ideas of infinity or manifestation seem out of reach. So, the bridge into experience could be:

Why plan for the future when we are infinite? Take a breath in while thinking about the breath out.

How can your imagination become real, right now? Make a butterfly out of your hands and watch it fly around.

Tired of playing a balancing act out of work versus life in pursuit of a more joyous life?

Society has placed an emphasis on this distinction, suggesting that it’s because we work too much that we are unhappy. Furthermore, it presents the idea that if we separate our career from the rest of our life, designating time to tend diligently to each one, then we will be happier. And still, stories continue to emerge about how tough it is to succeed in the traditional sense of a career while also maintaining a nourishing home, social life and connected family.

(Art by Jon Han)

It appears our mainstream society hasn't really executed a better balancing of work and life as separate pursuits. Perhaps this divisive way of thinking is contributing to a more fragmented life instead of offering us portals to wholeness.

So, let’s explore something new. There’s a budding new approach that suggests instead integrating work with life together. Instead of pursuing happiness and wholeness as an end goal, what if activating and integrating more aspects of ourselves within daily practices and routines allowed us to live into wholeness? I find truth in my experience of this.

In this endeavor, happiness simply becomes a by-product rather than an elusive holy grail.

This process could take many forms.

My attempt towards work-life integration thus far is an experiment that’s still underway. In order to make this life one beautiful adventure converging being and doing, I’ve been exploring discovering my unique purpose. As I sought to reveal the mysteries as to what I cared about most, it began to point strongly and continually to transformation. This includes how human consciousness can be expanded upon in order to alleviate suffering and help people realize their innate worth and interconnection here on earth.

So I’ve teamed up with others who have similar visions. We’ve created a community in a shared home in which we work and live as one endeavor. We pursue this in the name of expanding global access to ways of supporting those who desire to engage in a path of transformation. We’ve committed to our own transformative growth in alignment with this mission as well.

Our daily life includes well being practices such as meditation, exercise, healthy eating, and engaging spontaneous dialogues whereas all the while collaborative work projects are interwoven throughout.

There’s nothing to hide because nothing is separate. Our darkest fears, worries and weaknesses are just as present as our enchanting hopes and dreams.

In many ways this experience so far has proven to be paradoxically the most challenging endeavor I’ve ever undertaken, while also being the most fulfilling, meaningful and rewarding. My empathy as to why our culture has chosen to separate work and life, despite its ineffectiveness has grown as I’ve faced these challenges. I’ve had many moments where I have wanted to give up, yet the powerful vision of living a life engaged with purposeful work as a more and more whole version of myself prevails.

THE THRESHOLD OF DISCOVERY WHERE SCIENCE, SPIRIT AND HUMANITY ARE CONVERGING WITH TECHNOLOGY.

Existence in today’s era relates with humanity in new and fascinating ways. Although for centuries our connection with the cosmos has been interwoven within work, play, organizational systems and relationships, the way in which our unique place relates with these aspects is transforming.

There is a growing body of perception exploring how expanded awareness and sensory contact with the world and ourselves can be better understood by engaging with technology. A particular shared synchronization of this exploration unites under the global community of Consciousness Hacking. The inquiries arising in this space of transformative technologies involve asking questions around what it means to dismantle barriers in order to cultivate deeper connections with our hearts, bodies, minds, nature and each other.

These shared intentions within Consciousness Hacking focus on how technology can act as a self-exploration tool to offer us access to never before seen paths that can help us transform the way we think, feel, and live.

For example, these explorations can take us through experiences of suffering into states where we can then access more joy in our lives. While other movements seek to change the world itself, this community presents a different perspective regarding how technology can instead work with us by revealing an endless series of truths about our participation with existence. A welcoming aspect of this movement is that through these pursuits, we can maintain liberty as to how we choose to use this new awareness.

Scientific communities are increasingly recognizing what spiritual traditions have been advocating for thousands of years: through focused self-awareness we can fundamentally change our conscious experience. Now, both science and spirituality, together, help us see that the key to accessing profound joy and contentment lay not in our external circumstances, but in our relationship to ourselves.

Numerous scientific publications on mindfulness and meditation confirm the profound benefits reaped by contemplative practices with technologically supported evidence and feedback. These studies examine questions such as: Is modern enlightenment possible, in harmony with the media and technology that constantly externalize our attention and increase our sense of separation? Can we create new forms of technology to cultivate calm minds, improve relationships, rediscover connectedness, and enhance our lives?

These visionary questions might seem in direct conflict with the constant distraction and information overload surrounding us. Especially because many other pursuits in the current societal and cultural tech landscape aren’t yet involved directly in the techniques of transformative manifestations. But how can we expand these definitions of technology?

How can we embrace technology as a series of reflections about who and what we are collectively as a culture?

In the same way that a painting is a visible extension of the painter’s being, we are creating this world around us all the time. Technology is not static—it is the manifestation of human ingenuity. It can be anything we want it to be.

So, why does the ever-increasing number of devices around us only offer us glimpses of fleeting happiness? Why don’t our technological interactions offer us lasting nourishment and more meaningful living? One perspective is that this is because we have yet to cultivate the awareness about how to actually be happy. We have a tendency to wallow in psychological turmoil we label anxiety, depression, stress, or victimization. This prevalent suffering has fueled massive pharmaceutical, alcohol, and narcotic industries that only superficially mask the problem. Yet, we might be able to use technology in ways that instead help us understand our own role in contributing to this suffering. And, in turn, these techniques could help us sustain more joyful and meaningful living.

The human capacity for profound peace, connection, joy, unconditional love, and the recognition of our fundamentally unitive nature has been pointed to by countless spiritual and religious traditions for centuries. This is a fundamental human capacity, not a product of religion. Instead, religion and spiritual traditions are expressions of how humans discovered this within themselves and sought to connect through these revelations.

Consciousness Hacking embraces these capacities with new forms of connection. This includes ways in which we can transcend the restricting prison of language and the limitations of any single human perspective. The community includes exponential technologies into this experiential pursuit of an inherently dynamic, adaptive, and enlivening perception. The modalities seek to meet people exactly where they are, patiently and skillfully supporting the realization of the most profound aspects of our human experience. The current manifestations appear in forms of apps, wearable devices, and primitive artificially intelligent interactions. Yet, as these transformative technologies evolve, they continue to take on a category of their own. The creations in this category bridge reasoning and sensing into a seamless experience offering individuals the ability to understand their unique place in the whole as well as explore the sensational value of synchronization and entrainment.

Technologies, sciences and organizing intelligences do not have fixed locations; they are properties of the universe in which we participate.

Through expanding our sensory perceptions of these properties, we begin to take part in the animation of the growth of new cells, the evolution of new species, the design of computer systems, and the development of artificial intelligence into wisdom.

Wisdom, too, has no location and is not bound to human minds. Wisdom expressing through the language and being of a luminary, is just one way that it manifests. As easily as it expresses through word or deed, wisdom can also express through bits and bytes. Humanity has the capacity to play an integral role in this unfolding story where science, spirit and technology are converging. Let’s discover these new paths together.

Written by Mikey Siegel & Gareth Gwyn

We must therefore rediscover, after the natural world, the social world, not as an object or sum of objects, but as a permanent field or dimension of existence.

— Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception

If you choose to entertain the vantage point that everything is connected, literally everything, it can lead to the idea that our work and creations are living parts of ourselves.

Therefore, when contemplating what goods, services, arts and products to invest time and energy into making, it’s strikingly worthy of exploring how the nature of our being is embedded into those tangible extensions.

In other words, the societal impact of the design of good and services we create is dependent upon the foundational state of our being.

This begs an inquiry: How we can transform our own personal growth in alignment with the creation process?

Perhaps as we continue to expand our own consciousness, the tools and techniques we assemble can also become transformational catalysts for others. In theory this may sound simple, yet a daily practice of on-going transformation is not a light endeavor. It’s also not one to undertake alone. It necessitates a community with the same caliber of commitment.

So we created one.

I’m pleased to introduce to you, The CoHack Home! This is a new project merging living, working, and transformation. We are a group of people who are choosing to act upon this perspective and explore the implications in ourselves and in the impact of our work. Our intentional community is made of 10 scientists, hackers, artists and entrepreneurs living in a home overlooking the expansive natural landscape in San Carlos. The mission of the home is to act as a base and cultural nexus point, supporting Bay Area entrepreneurs, makers, investors, and visionaries seeking to innovate spiritual practice, growth and well-being.

Although we are just getting started, it’s fascinating thus far. We engage in hacking our consciousness from multiple angles including explorations of modern technologies and practices involved with transformational healing modalities. In addition to hosting events and workshops, we share morning routines of exercise and meditation, hold engaging brainstorms, team up on tech and design projects, support each other in intrapersonal processes, celebrate authentic relating, cook delicious and healthy food, hike together in the gorgeous hills, strategize and execute bold plans, experiment with tools at the intersection of technology and consciousness and set intentions of love and beauty. In times of struggle, we lead each other back to our own hearts.

This experiment demonstrates that it is possible to merge the ways of peaceful life in a meditation ashram with more energetic ambitious work pursuits. We celebrate that through being the best version of ourselves, our creations catalyze others to be their best selves too.

THIS IS A STORY ABOUT HOW I FOUND A COMMUNITY WHO CONVERGES THE GRANDEST PURPOSES OF LOVE INTO MODERN DAY ENDEAVORS. IT’S HARD TO BEAT EXPLORING HOW TECHNOLOGY, BUSINESS, SCIENCE CAN CONVERGE WITH LOVE.

I was on a Skype call with Marc Winn. He was on Guernsey Island off the coast of France and I was in downtown Chicago. My mind tried once again to find the words to explain how important I believe it is to view our experiences through a series of infinite frequency interactions.

This was another of my many attempts to communicate how significant it is to me to never lose sight of how what we perceive as properties, such as matter, are actually just representing a depiction of a transitory densities resulting from a unique combination of vibrational interactions. The Beatles articulated this in less scientific terms, “I am you and you are me and we are all together,” helping to disclose our innate interconnectedness with everything. Getting lost in hippie dippie love songs is a valued past-time, yet I’ve always desired to leverage this perspective to bring more love into the world in more tangible ways. And today’s playground often includes the world of what we call technology.

Often in the past, when I’ve disclosed my passion for this perspective, the reactions involve how it’s rather irrelevant to a career pursuit, especially because I don’t have a degree in quantum physics or anything so deeply entrenched in the mathematical modeling of it all.

BUT THIS TIME WAS DIFFERENT.

Marc’s reaction was one of complete understanding. He didn’t even ask for clarification. He actually spoke to how most of the modern day ventures in exponential technology effectively impact culture, yet they hit a wall when it comes to consciousness expansion.

A SMALL PART OF ME FELT VALIDATED. FINALLY.

Marc then proceeded to tell me about a growing assembly of people from around the world: Consciousness Hacking. He explained that this group shares ardent passions for helping tackle the world’s most critical challenges, yet through the lens of where the most fundamental levels of technology meet the most fundamental levels of human existence.

THE BEST PART IS IT’S ALSO ALL IN THE NAME OF MINDFULNESS, EMPATHY AND LOVE.

All the sudden my previous self-doubts about lack of scientific degrees suspended for a moment. There must be somewhere within this community I can explore where my own unique talents can help.

The following months marked a pivotal moment in my dive into pursuing my deepest dreams and the Consciousness Hacking (CH) community played a big role in that. I attended CH meet-ups in Manhattan and San Francisco. And even participated in the Transformative Technology Conference, a major Consciousness Hacking assembly held at Sofia University in Palo Alto.

I heard energetic founders of companies speak to how their products help induce mindfulness. I listened in fascination to scientists explain how we can quantify brain waves emitted and then activate a transformative healing process to generate new waves, ones more associated with joy instead of fear. We played with tools of entrainment. We engaged in dialogues about methods of what empathy means in science. And so.much.more.

WHAT I DISCOVERED IS THIS IS NOT ONLY A RARE GROUP OF PEOPLE WHO DON’T SETTLE FOR LESS THAN BRINGING LOVE INTO THE WORLD, THEY ALSO PURSUE IT AT THE MOST EFFECTIVE AND POTENT CHANNELS.

Do I think what we term “technology” is the answer to dissolving suffering within the human experience? No. But I think it’s one tool we have to work with as a current and potent extension of our own selves. It's also an effective lens to comprehend our already innate interconnectedness. I'm also curious to explore how technology can help us reveal interactive patterns in real-time that have never before been visualized or experienced. Although, regardless of the tool, opening broader access to love is fundamentally what I’m after.

AMID MANY EGO-DRIVEN BUSINESS PURSUITS, THERE’S ALSO A COMMUNITY OF HUMANS THAT DON’T SETTLE FOR LESS THAN THE DRIVING PURPOSE OF HELPING HUMANS TO SUFFER LESS. THIS EMERGING WAVE OF PEOPLE ARE ASSEMBLING UNDER THE CONSCIOUSNESS HACKING UMBRELLA, HELPING OUR SPECIES TO ULTIMATELY ACCESS MORE LOVE IN TANGIBLE WAYS.

When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate. 

How Learning From Monk Sand Mandala Processes Could Help Drive Agile Work Environments and Extend Organizational Lifetimes

REFLECTIONS ON AN experiment in dissolving the work/joy dichotomy through hacking an app while meditating on vacation.

It’s productive and effective to bring distinct people together with a shared purpose to make fascinating creations. Combine that with merging the office space with a retreat center and conduct a vacation at the same time, now that is simply just brilliant.

Sign me up.

The Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS) and Consciousness Hacking shared an interest in developing a smartphone app to test for and experiment with psychic abilities. They also wanted to have fun doing it. Their approach was to recruit a targeted group of people and host a full-on Hackation.

At the same time I was giddy about getting to be a part of this weekend venture, I was also pretty nervous. Ok, really nervous. Not only did I doubt my lack of coding skills and knowledge about the science of consciousness, I had no clue what I could contribute to such a brilliant team.

One part of my mind asked another part of my mind questions such as, what if I’m a fraud? It was as if my brain part that asked was expecting some sort of solution-based response from it’s companion. No solutions emerged. Instead the mental banter just erupted into a vicious unproductive mind cycle of insecurity.

Ugh. Stuck.

I remembered a commitment I had made to myself to never deny the information brought to me through my emotional senses. So I figured there was nothing to lose and I decided to own up to my fear-based state of being and spilled the beans about my self-doubt to the small group I was sharing a table with. The first breakthrough happened when a few others expressed they shared similar feelings of inadequacy. Yikes, I thought, now I’ve started a pity party. I’ve made things worse and now even more of us are distracted from productivity. And yet, that’s not what unfolded.

The resulting experience was beautiful. And it’s not about the vacation part.

Julia, the director at IONS Innovation Lab, embraced it all. She started by offering words of encouragement about our talents. Her main message however, was when she explained that in order to unlock our best creative powers, it helps to first meet our own selves at a place of deep faith in our true worth to exist without any need to create anything. Then she basically detached us from any expectation of contributing to the project. Looking back, I see how this could have been risky. The Innovation Lab had assumed the costs to host this Hackation and she was literally telling this group we could just go play in the gorgeous grassy Petaluma hills.

But that isn’t what happened.

Our small group continued the dialogue about self-worth, self-love and our existence not being based around the need to produce. Ironically, after this entire ten-minute experience was over, the level of energy had been shifted to one of exuberance.

Some of us did take a break for a bit, but ultimately what emerged was an unexpected wave of productive creativity. For example, I was able to design a storyboard for the coders so they’d have clarity about what the user experience involved.

What I had been unable to remember during the initial stages of fear was that I was around a bunch of people who enjoy working in the consciousness space because in addition to the goods and services explored, they also value being highly conscious themselves. This Hackation not only merged hacking + a vacation, it also merged meditation aspects of allowing every single experience to arise as sacred + work dynamics. And ultimately, the team produced in two days what often takes teams many months.

The underlying idea is that when internal emotional experiences are denied, numbed or suppressed – they block our creative expressions and also come back to haunt us again and again. If they are fully expressed with care and love, then they dissolve back into the field of infinite possibility and the body opens up and delights in creation again. Of course we dove into the physiology and science behind all this, but I’ll spare that part of the story here. Conceptually, this may not sound revolutionary, but executing this concept in a pressure-filled work environment in real-time is another matter. Not something I’d seen executed previously.

After the event ended as we continued to collaborate on Slack, I noticed someone express their gratitude for the event to the group by writing:

The collective space had an awareness allowing me to stay grounded and see what comes up instead of rejecting the experience.

Apparently others were experiencing the benefits of this unique environment too.

So that’s what I mean by:

experiments in dissolving the work/joy dichotomy through hacking an app while meditating on vacation.

I'm filing it in my memory as a measurement of success. It also certainly aligns with my goals in converging love and work. And it's way beyond solely focusing on the product outcome.

Driven Forward by the Forces of Successive Stages of Consciousness

I'm pursuing the beautiful intersection of where work meets love. As depicted in my flight plan, this involves the convergence of consciousness, communication and commerce. It also involves deliberate focus on expansion of my own consciousness. I view this as fundamental to discovering and releasing my potentials as well as accessing the most effective channels for my creative expression.

This epic journey includes taking a heavenly ride inward to the home of the self, dancing with old and new clay-like identities and exposing the sub-conscious shadows of my psyche to the light of the day.

The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence. Nikola Tesla

As Tesla so urgently stated, the convergence between these seemingly disparate worlds can be a transformative foundation to work from. Combining the esoteric worlds of consciousness with more science-driven approaches is not only fascinating, it’s grounding. Therefore, my recent explorations have included working with The Institute of Noetic Sciences and Nine Gates Mystery School. Both of these organizations value the bridge of how we can bring the mysteries of the cosmos into everyday reality for more meaningful living.

And still, my mission is beyond just constructing a meaningful vocation, it’s also rooted in being a productive and healing ripple within our broader co-existing world.

Consider this:

The structure of society does not enforce imitation and conformity. The human fear of self-actualization necessitates structures that enable imitation and conformity. There would be riots demanding such structures if they didn’t exist. No government in history has ever had to deal with the problem of too many of its citizens wanting to live so imaginatively that institutions based on conformity and imitation become unsustainable. If anything, the problem has always been the reverse one: getting enough of the population to act with enough imagination to keep the institutions alive. (Venkatesh Rao)

This perspective is powerful because it begs each human to take responsibility for himself or herself as an individual. It offers credence to how we can take accountability for the creation of our identities, lives and creative expressions, rather than get stuck in fear-based entitlement demands. A country filled with increasing self-accountable and self-actualized people could be a peaceful and loving place to live. Therefore, in light of doing what I can for contributing to a more liberated world, I’m driven to continually discover where my love of myself and of life intersects with purpose-driven work product.

The old temple inscription "Know Thyself" is often repeated today, but perhaps it is not adequate. It should declare "Construct Thyself" as well. Shape your mind, train your thinking power, and direct your emotions more rationally; liberate your behavior from the ancestral burden of reptiles and monkeys—be a man and use your intelligence to orient the reactions of your mind.

San Francisco Bay, January 2016

Beyond the horizon of the place we lived when we were youngIn a world of magnets and miraclesOur thoughts strayed constantly and without boundaryThe ringing of the division bell had begun

Explore A brief glimpse into the past few months of living from the roots of my own rhythm:

“Think... of the world you carry within you.” -Rainer M Rilke

Do you ever have the feeling of excitement when you come across a passage in a book, a song, or a painting that so deeply speaks to you? Well, that's how I feel right now about the below excerpt from Bill Plotkin's presentation of Soulcraft.

She no longer conforms to nor rebels against society, she chooses a third way.

She wanders, beyond the confines of her precious identity. The wanderer crosses and recrosses borders in order to find something whose location is unknown and unknowable. She will conclude she has found it not by its location, but by how it feels, how it resonates with her upon discovery. She doesn't know where or when or how clues will appear, so she wanders incessantly, both inwardly and outwardly, always looking, imagining, feeling.

In her wandering, she makes her own path.

The wanderer discovers her unique path by perceiving the world with imagination and feeling. She senses what is possible as well as actual. She sees into people, places and possibilities, and she cultivates a relationship with the invisible realms as much as with the visible. She is in conversation with the mysteries of the world, on the lookout for signs and omens. She attend especially to the edges, those places where one thing merges with another, where consciousness shifts and opens, where the world becomes something different from what it initially appeared to be.

The wanderer seeks to discover her unique and authentic place in life. Not just any place will do.

Her authentic place is not simply one that someone will pay her to occupy (like a job), nor a task she happens to have talent to preform (like an art or craft), nor a career a vocational counselor recommends for her (like banking or social work), nor a social role (like caregiver, student, parent, servant or leader, whore or rebel) in which other people will accept her. It's got to be her place, one in keeping with her virtual core. It is a place defined not by the deeds she performs, but by the qualities of the soul she embodies; not by her physical, social or economic achievements, but by the true character she manifests; neither by her capacity to conform to the masses nor by her ability to creatively rebel against the mainstream, but...

...by the unique way she performs her giveaway for her community.

My gratitude to Bill Plotkin for discovering these truths. I am also thankful he took the time to find a way to so eloquently articulate and share them, so people such as me could find resonance, hope and connection in understanding.

“We need to find within technology that there is something we can do which is capable of taking care of everybody, and to demonstrate that this is so. That’s what geodesic domes are about and that’s what my whole life has been about.” –Buckminster Fuller

Throughout all these crazy adventures, there surfaced a magical re-occurrence of geodesic domes in my life. I can’t help but explore the synchronicities! This includes a fun contemplation regarding the role they play in the external reflection of my internal pursuit – all based in energy proficiency, structural veracity and the ability to endure all types of natural disasters with resiliency and grace.

While gathering to explore the depths of consciousness with many other curious beings, we met in a white mystical dome in the mountains. My current understanding is that this is a group who all share a pursuit of continual discoveries around the threshold of where deep internal revelations meet the power of external collective physicalities. The dome blanketed our ambitious group with love while we dove into uncharted territories together. The acoustics in the structure were exceptionally fun for experimentation.

The second dome that emerged ended up being the place in which I am now living. Nestled up in the Woodside Highlands of California is a heartwarming dome community that welcomed me with open arms. I was told that these domes were originally built as a hippie commune. My experience living here has involved feeling an environment of inclusivity from the neighbors as well as a certain wisdom from the enchanting domes themselves. Gratitude flowing.

A third dome intersected my explorations and served as my roof for four nights at the Science and Nonduality Conference. This white geodesic dome was erected on the lawn outside of the mansion in which the conference was being held. After long days of mind-bending conversations, we’d have tea parties and music in this geodome as night fell. Curled up in a sleeping bag under the spherical geometry, I slept soundly and my dreams ran free.

While diving into the unknown and learning to thrive in ambiguity, these unexpected geodesic domes have offered welcomed shelter.

ThE DOME embodiment of an open spaciousness, while concurrently remaining structurally profound, has offered a grand metaphor for the attributes I am also cultivating within my own self.

Far away from my sweet pup and my cottage in Chapel Hill, NC, I am sitting in a hostel in Wicker Park, Chicago. My endeavor here is centered around how and why I am choosing to take responsibility for my part in contributing to a positive cultural transformation underway. This shift I am referring to is how our society is poised at the "seed-time of a new personalist culture."

Firstly, what is seed-time? And what is a personalist culture? Seed-time is the moment of a new beginning. When a seed is planted in the ground and the surrounding conditions are just right -- soil, sunlight, water -- it will sprout at the right time and eventually become a strong tree, plant or living entity. In the same way, societies and individuals encounter seed-time -- moments in history in which multiple aspects of society are increasingly aligned around specific growth transformations.

This begs the question: In what direction is humanity currently transforming? Theodore Rosak, in People/Planet (see below for context in excerpt), introduces the idea that we are living in the fertile time of a new cultural transformation in which multiple aspects of society are increasingly personalized around individuals according to their desires and uniqueness. This also includes where and how these individual traits intersect with the deeper ecological and technological spheres.

This transformation of individual lifestyle design is underway in technology as we customize our phones and measure our unique body activities through wearables. It's underway in the creation of new business models as they meet needs of individual consumers. It's underway in the advancements of personalized medicine, as we tailor drugs and health solutions suited for unique genetic sequences and diseases.

And yet, customizing a phone, and other desired experiences, doesn't foster true cultivation of a person's unique identity.

Although, a new personalized learning process could.

Alright, so what does this have to do with why I am living in a hostel in Wicker Park? Because as an individual, I am owning my own growth as I strategize and design my life forward.

If we entertain Rosak's prophetic vision, then spiritually, ecologically, biologically and technologically, the time has come for each individual to discover their uniqueness and find a way to channel their energy system into vocations that align their individual fulfillment with the fulfillment of universal progress.

Dabbling with band-aid solutions, like flexible work schedules and workplace perks, will continue to prove insufficient at fulfilling human potentials. Therefore, this is one reason I chose to leave the security of a multinational corporate job to join the pioneering leaders at Experience Institute who are transforming learning models with the bold mission to authentically bring out the best in individuals. Although in one perspective, this could be viewed as a selfish motive because I want to bring out the best in myself, my true belief is that continually growing into an infinite series of better versions of myself is truly the greatest gift I could give to all of humanity, all entities and all life.

Hidden in the chaotic industrialized workplace, I was truly seeking to know myself and then construct my identity accordingly. But now, I am taking stance to own the responsibility myself, as I embrace the interconnectedness of all things, and discover my unique aspirations that are entangled within biology, technology and consciousness, and to live them out vividly with bold purpose.

Experience Institute offers a solid community of support and tools to help trigger self-discovery and shape key skills and abilities. Evenmoreso, the team cultivates the rare space for individuals to learn how to shine their brightest.

As the light that shines farthest often shines brightest at home, we must learn to find our home within ourselves.

I'm on my way home. And I'm ready to design it as my own.

Reference Theodore Roszak's words in 1979:

It may only be a certain nagging sense that the world you live in does not fit. The job you hold, the education you receive, the institutions that claim authority over you (the government, the corporations, the unions, the courts, the welfare system), all these may seem to have been crudely designed for everybody in general, but for nobody in person, least of all for you.

These may come and go as fleeting, private irritations.

Nevertheless, they are signs that the great change I speak of is at work in your experience, nourishing a certain brash assurance in you that you have a right to be handled with care, a right to the employment, education, time and space you need to find your peculiar style, a right to participate directly in the decisions that shape your life even if exercising that right means endless delay and disruption.

But where do you think these rights come from? How long do you think they have existed? Which is really to ask, how long do you think your experience of uniqueness has existed in the world? Perhaps you sense that such rights would have been seen as preposterous luxuries by your grandparents, perhaps even by your parents. But do you know they would have been regarded as utterly incomprehensible no more than a century ago, even as a kind of intolerable insanity? Would you be surprised to discover that this right you feel so certain is yours, this right to have your uniqueness respected, perhaps even cultivated, is not at all a simple extension of traditional values like civil liberty, equality, social democracy, which is precisely why it must now pit itself against so many institutions that were created to further those familiar ideals, but that it springs independently from another, far more mysterious source, one that reaches into the biological foundations of life.

"The trick is to combine your waking rational abilities with the infinite possibilities of your dreams. Cuz if you can do that, then you can do anything."

R. Linklater

The Way It Is

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among things that change. But it doesn’t change.People wonder about what you are pursuing. You have to explain about the thread.But it is hard for others to see.While you hold it you can’t get lost. Tragedies happen; people get hurt or die; and you suffer and get old.Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding. You don’t ever let go of the thread.

W. Stafford

You see, history has historically been how we choosewhat data to forget. Our brains work that way too. We don’t form memories to write our stories. We write our stories to suppress inconvenient memories. If you ever go spelunking in the Big Data dump that is your subconscious, you will find a spaghetti landscape of crime-scene tape. History is the technology of forgetting, not the technology of remembering.